Beaten to Death - Agronomicon

By Matt Hinch. Back in 2011, this crazy-ass Norwegian band called Beaten to Death decided they were going to take up permanent residence in my head with Xes and Strokes. Seven years, two albums and a live release later, the “melodic grindcore” outfit return.

By Matt Hinch.


Back in 2011, this crazy-ass Norwegian band called Beaten to Death decided they were going to take up permanent residence in my head with Xes and Strokes. Seven years, two albums and a live release later, the “melodic grindcore” outfit return with a pretty swell Christmas present in Agronomicon.

In keeping with their vision for the band, Agronomicon was recorded 100% live. Also, as usual, they bend grindcore at will with their spastic enthusiasm. It's infectious. Their tempo change strategy must revolve around firing a rubber ball around the room and switching when someone gets hit in the head. Dirgy, death metal pummelling, ding, blasting grind, ding, groovy romp, clunk, Telecaster twang, thump, CHAOS. It seems like it should give my straightforward brain a headache but B2D just do it so well. Perhaps they do it too well and have spoiled bands with similar approaches. Names have been omitted to protect the innocent.

There's just something great about an album that can have you circle-headbanging one moment, throwing elbows the next, then swaying your hips and looking for a dance partner until you're spun back into a maelstrom of intensity and cathartic energy.

No matter how gut-wrenching B2D can get at times there's always another time that's totally uplifting. Or how angry they can sound, or disgusting, there's a jangly bit to throw open the shutters and dispel the darkness.

Speaking of gut-wrenching, angry, and disgusting, let's not forget about those vocals I love so much. Not just the leads but the well-timed gang shouts too. They're a good source of involuntary muscle contraction. All of the muscles. I hope I'm not the only one that connects with the vocal Hydra. Piercing screams, experimentation, and that growl. Oh, that growl.

The nature of that feral growl is my spirit animal. That makes about as much sense as building a house with an inflatable hammer but what I'm trying to say is deep down, that's what my inner beast sounds like. That's what this album does to you, man. Scrambles your brain. Like an egg in a frying pan on those old anti-drug ad campaigns. Without all the legal trouble and just as much social stigma.

Time and time again I'm wowed by how Beaten to Death can pack such intensity and creativity into such a short runtime and still infuse it with melody and movement. It's like a dramatic comedy stage play sped way the fuck up. It's definitely not mindless. I think it's their uniqueness that puts them over the top. No one sounds like this. Agronomicon throws more wood on the fire heating their melting pot of crazy fun grind. Why isn't this band more talked about? Or am I just too busy listening to them to hear the noise? I mean, it's like standing in a boxing ring taking endless body shots while being thrown from corner to corner all while laughing with euphoria. Doesn't that sound great?

Atanamar’s Favorite Albums of 2013

MOBILE PREVIEW

By Atanamar Sunyata.

Django the Thrawsuncat

I dedicated myself to the cessation of physical media in 2013. I’ve had a long and illustrious career of collecting CDs, as the sagging shelves of my voluminous and hulking media racks can testify. But lest my house collapse and its foundations shatter under the weight of plastic discs, I have chosen another path.

As I will settle for nothing less than lossless digital audio (I discussed the glory of FLAC here), Bandcamp is the place to be, and here we are. Regardless of your chosen format, Bandcamp’s social features have turned out to be indispensably badass, leading this lost soul to many a marvelous musical discovery.

Still, there are recalcitrant and tardy record labels that aren’t completely on board our party boat. Thankfully, nearly all of my favorite albums made their way onto Bandcamp this year. I do have a few regrets; I wish Profound Lore would keep their store up to date. Castevet’s Obsian would most certainly be in my top five. Also, P.L.F.’s Devious Persecution And Wholesale Slaughter is ludicrously delicious grind; I don’t know why small labels like Six Weeks Records aren’t leveraging the platform.

Alas, I’ll keep it true; these are my favorite Bandcamp albums of 2013:

14. Mephistopheles – Sounds of the End

Cover art by Bill Dean.

Mephistopheles convey an articulate death metal chaos, forging something raw and primitive from esoteric riffs and peculiar melody. Strange arpeggios roll together in bizarre and baroque arrangements. Schizophrenic balance is preferred to overt brutality; Sounds of the End is uniquely satisfying.

13. Scale the Summit – The Migration

Believe me, instrumental prog-metal was the last thing I imagined falling in love with this year. The Migration walks the fine line of wankery and sweet shred, conjuring visions of Gordian Knot and Cynic circa 1993 along the way.

12. Vastum – Patricidal Lust
You know when you put on an album, and you’re compelled to turn it up louder, and louder, and louder? Patricidal Lust is that kind of album. Vastum marry the most seductive elements of death metal, laying lusty riffs over neck-wrecking cadence. Surrender yourself to the primal power death.

11. Lantern – Below

Illustration by Alexander L. Brown.

Below sounds like it was recorded in Belo Horizonte circa 1987, in the same subterranean grotto as Sepultura’s Schizophenia. Speaking in tongues of noxious catacombs and desecrated cathedrals, Lantern leverage superlative riffs in a morbid pursuit of quirky, proto-death glory.

10. Ulcerate - Vermis

Artwork by Jamie Saint Merat.

Ulcerate use dissonance as a weapon of mass destruction, scouring the outer limits of rhythmic oddity. Inhuman feats and unfathomable riffs mark this marvelous, bleak listening experience. Vermis is pleasure and pain.

9. Bölzer - Aura
Bölzer bring the thunderous, bulldozing, death-black goodness on their debut EP. These ball-crushing compositions are blessed with unhinged vocals and impossibly compelling riffs. The entire package is seasoned with satisfyingly sinister melody.

8. Gigan – Multi-Dimensional Fractal-Sorcery And Super Science

Artwork by Dr.Winter

Gigan have traversed the summit of utter oddity and descend now into lands of compelling technical death-grind. Make no mistake; this is some crazy shit. These impossible odes to deep space dementia, however, are sustained by the mundane magics of songwriting skill, riffs, and rage. I gladly resign my sanity unto Gigan.

7. Exhumed – Necrocracy
Exhumed push closer and closer to death metal nirvana with each release. Necrocracy slips and slides through tight curves of thrashing death-grind annihilation. Every move feels effortless, every riff is righteously ripping, and every solo is sinuous melodic perfection.

6. Aosoth – Arrow in Heart

Cover art by Benjamin A. Vierling

Aosoth nail the heart of my preferred black metal aesthetic in 2013. My initial trepidation regarding the album’s sultry sonic palate melted into adoration and addiction. The warm swarm, the gorgeously organic drums, and the carefully crafted madness are irresistible to my ears.

5. Gorguts – Colored Sands

Artwork by Martin Lacroix.

I was the guy who thought Obscura sucked when it first came out, selling it back immediately to the music store from whence it came. Clutching my copies of Considered Dead and The Erosion of Sanity, I wept at the album’s flippy-floppy oddity. Oh, ye death metal purist, how the years have proven you wrong. Returned from the grave, with Dysrhythmia in hand, Gorguts have constructed a modern classic. I would not be sad if Luc Lemay were my father.

4. Vex – Memorious
Vex slice and dice metal tropes in an endlessly listenable manner. Death, black, folk, and traditional truths are sculpted into paeans to soaring victory. Ridiculous riffs and boisterous dynamics seal the deal; Memorious won’t soon fade from memory.

3. Beaten to Death – Dødsfest!

Dødsfest! is an ode to joy and a lethal dose of fuck-all freedom. Although presented with tongue firmly in cheek, the album's unique grindcore vision is endearing and irresistible. Bravery and innovation are useless in metal without the chops to back them up; Dødsfest! is wall to wall riffage of the utmost quality. Check your pretensions at the door, or fuck off and die.

2. Cloud Rat – Moksha

Artwork by Brian Uhl.

With delicate grind-sludge destruction, d-beat debauchery, and impossibly vicious vocals, Cloud Rat have concocted the year’s most genuine articulation of rage. Moksha is diverse, but effortlessly complete in vision, welding beauty to a chassis of blastbeats and Thou-worthy trudge. Moksha’s lyrical sentiments speak to me, as do its attractive departures into melancholy. Cloud Rat summon sublime, immersive fury; I’ve been basking in it all year.

1. Thrawsunblat – Wanderer on the Continent of Saplings

If I rated albums solely on the number of headbangs they induced, the number of invisible oranges they caused me to crush, or the number of inextricable air guitar outbursts generated, Thrawsunblat would win in a landslide. Beyond the visceral appeal of Wanderer, however, lies a brilliant articulation of songwriting majesty and compositional might. Sage sentiments are woven into arcane tales of woodland legend, warfare, and loss. I rarely identify so closely with all aspects of an album, but Wanderer has been a constant companion, filled with irresistible riffs, rhythm, and vocals. Strive, struggle, mourn, but emerge victorious. “If every step is a mountain, enjoy the fucking view, and see the miles you’ve traveled stretching out below you. If nothing is forever, we are roaring stars. All that we endeavor is all of who we are.”

Beaten to Death - Dødsfest!

Written by Matt Hinch.


Norway's Beaten to Death burst onto the scene back in 2011 with Xes and Strokes. That album came out of nowhere like a pillowcase full of bricks at a teenage slumber party. They wasted no time and released a live DVD titled At Rockefeller in 2012. I've only heard the recording but B2D were as tight as you'd expect from a band that records 100% live. Apparently the fire was still burning hot enough for these grindcore planet smashers to bring us a new ode to awesomeness in Dødsfest!

As with Xes and Strokes, Beaten to Death take less than 20 minutes to grind your eardrums into a bloody pulp. The guilty parties of Martin Rygge and Tommy Hjelm (guitars. also of Insense), bassist Mika Martinussen, drummer Christian Svendson (Tsjuder) and She Said Destroy vocalist Anders Bakke take every iota of frustration and expunge it with reckless abandon.

Not a moment goes by where at least one element of this construction isn't defining extreme. Okay, maybe the funky bit in “Obliteration of Nekromantheon”. Even that gets the funk out in a hurry. That's the way it is with Dødsfest!. Nothing sits around long enough to get comfortable. B2D are constantly shifting from tire burning grind to intricate melodies and crushing and sludgy doom passages.

As mentioned, there's always a measure of intensity. At least one member is always going completely off the rails in some respect. If it's not Bakke's Travis Ryan-level vocal gymnastics, it's usually Svendson's flattening percussive madness. Dude can lay down some serious blasts, and his double-kick work in “Vinni Butterfly” is just one of enough “Holy Fuck!!” moments to pop a nun's cherry. Another being Mika's growling bass on “Krepsekamp”. So gnarly.

“True Norwegian Internet Metal Warrior” features not only some of the most heavy hitting downstrokes from Rygge and Hjelm but also some of their best guitar interplay as well. Not to mention how that title shows off the band's sense of humour. (“The Flesh Prince With Swell Hair” anyone?)

Dødsfest! is the kind of record in which the listener is forced to be active in the experience. Passivity is not an option. The rousing choruses of “Dov, Dovere, Dod” and “The Egg Thrower” connect with that emotional core and pull out the compulsion to scream along with unstoppable force. Beyond the vocal level, B2D inject enough groove to get the head moving (“Aspen Hellweek”) if you're not already actively looking for targets to slam your body against.

Enough can't be said of Dødsfest!'s intensity. Knowing it was recorded live in the band's rehearsal space no doubt adds to that feeling. It's grind as fuck yet kept in check (sort of) by those ever-sweet melodies and moments of monolithic riffs. An electric energy powers their high octane grindcore. Monstrous tone, fantastic drumming and one of the most engaging and diverse vocals performances to be heard this year mesh with dynamic songwriting and tight playing to make the tracklist of Dødsfest! one knockout punch after another. Learn to bob and weave, son, or you'll find yourself on your ass.

[Go to the post to view the Bandcamp player]